


Contention

by Belle_Evans



Category: 3:10 to Yuma (2007)
Genre: M/M, Sexual Interference with a minor, Underage Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-25
Updated: 2013-08-25
Packaged: 2017-12-24 14:10:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/940899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Belle_Evans/pseuds/Belle_Evans
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Charlie Prince met Ben Wade when he was fifteen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Contention

**Author's Note:**

> When I first saw 3:10 to Yuma and Charlie’s steely eyed determination to get Ben Wade back, I thought oh yes. Movie events entwined with pre-movie back-story. The original prompt for this was firepower.
> 
>  
> 
> The characters belong to James Mangold and the original creators of 3:10. It's certainly not my fault that they imbued Charlie Prince with a burning passion for Ben Wade.

Astride his horse, Charlie Prince surveyed the dusty street with psychotic glee. He knew Ben Wade was proud. He had seen it in his eyes when he'd tossed the boss his hat. The same eyes that had pierced him, marked him from under the brim of a similar hat the very first time he'd looked at Charlie. 

Shortly after Charlie's fifteenth birthday, one sunny Nevada morning the Wade Gang galloped into Carter's River. They murdered the judge, the Marshall and the lone deputy their first few minutes in town. Some of the men got a posse together to offer resistance, but none of them could shoot as well as the Wade gang. They might have had a chance had they asked Charlie. He was the best gun in the town, but no one much talked to him so no one much knew. 

When he was ten, Charlie had stumbled into Carter's River alone, covered in blood. Doc Carter, a descendant of the town's founders, had seen to his injuries which amounted to some cuts and scrapes that weren't life threatening. The town blacksmith, James Prince and his wife immediately volunteered to take Charlie into their home. The Doc told the town that whatever had happened to Charlie was so terrible that he was unable to remember, unable to say what had happened to his family or where they were.

The town speculated about Apaches and outlaws, but Charlie was never able to direct them one way or the other. And no one ever came looking for him. As the time passed, some of the speculation turned ugly. The Princes were unable to get him to go to Sunday school. At the schoolhouse, the teacher reported that he stared into space through a good deal of the lesson, which on the whole she found much preferable to him looking at her with his dull flat eyes. 

Then some in the town began to suggest that maybe Charlie had done something to his family, that there wasn't something quite right about him. A few noted that when the McAllister barn burned, while others scrambled to form a bucket brigade, Charlie Prince simply stood and stared at the flames. Eventually, Mrs. Prince tried mightily to convince her husband that it might be better if Charlie bunked in the stable, instead of the house. Mr. Prince balked at the idea of Charlie living with the horses, but the Mrs. would not be put off. Finally, the blacksmith sat Charlie down and told him that he was old enough to be treated like a man, told him that he would be living in the blacksmith shop, that it would be his responsibility to watch over it. There were those in Carter's River who took that as permission and they simply stopped making the effort. After all, it wasn't as though he was anyone's kin. Charlie had been twelve. 

Three years later, with most of the makeshift posse dead or dying, Ben Wade dismounted from his horse stepped over Mr. Prince, who was one of the dying and sauntered into the blacksmith's shop. While others had taken cover, Charlie had remained just inside the shop, in his leather apron and gloves, riveted. He hadn't flinched, hadn't backed away when Ben Wade stopped right in front of him. Instead, he met the eyes that peered at him from underneath a stiff brimmed black hat with a dark sash. 

"Boy, I don't think you're a blacksmith at all. _But_ , since you're standin’ in the blacksmith’s, my horse needs shoes. When you're done, don't tie the horse. Understand?" 

Charlie's body had tingled at the rough burr in that voice. And Ben Wade had looked right at him the way no one else in Carter's River had since he was twelve. There had been no fear and he'd known one thing instantly. Ben Wade's horse would be the last he ever shod. With barely a glance for the man who had taken him in, Charlie picked up his hammer and began the work. 

The next day, when Ben Wade whistled up his horse, Charlie Prince was already ready to ride. Wade had simply looked at him in that way again, claimed his horse and ridden off. Charlie had waited only a few minutes before spurring his own horse. 

He rode behind the gang, easily staying with them over several miles of difficult terrain. Not once did any of the crew look back. When they stopped to make camp for the night, Charlie also made camp nearby. Afterwards, he did as he always had. He found a secluded spot and shot. At critters, at trees, at whatever he fancied needed shooting. That was where Wade found him. 

Wade stepped up right behind Charlie and his arm faltered, barely a fraction. 

“Keep your arm up,” Ben Wade's voice rumbled in his ear as arms slipped under his. Calloused hands moved slowly beneath his shirt, over his chest. He shuddered and felt a tingle of something he had never felt in his life. Excitement. 

“Keep shootin,", Ben growled deeper right before Charlie felt the flat moist heat of Wade’s tongue against his neck. And then Wade’s lips were right at his ear, the warmth of his breath tickled.

“No matter what. You wanna ride with me, you don’t let go of your pistol. The Marshall’s are shootin', posses are right on our hooves. Bullets all around, you keep shootin’ understand.”

Charlie had understood, but he’d barely been able to nod. It had taken all his concentration to keep his grip on the gun as Wade’s too hot hands slid roughly over his chest. Callouses scraped over his nipples, buckling his knees.

"No matter what," came the growl again. Charlie locked his knees and held onto his gun. 

"Good boy Charlie. You’re fast. I reckon if you could shoot with both hands, you would really be something." And then there had been cool night air at his back. Wade was gone. 

The next day mirrored the first. They rode, they camped. Charlie scrounged a second pistol. Later, Ben Wade came upon him practicing as he had before.

"That's a lot of firepower in your hands boy. You gotta learn to use it properly." 

There was the heat of a solid body behind his. Charlie had expected to feel calloused hands under his shirt again. Instead, a heavy hand brushed the front of his britches. Nimble fingers flicked open his buttons one by one and jerked the rough material down slim hips. He was a fast learner, he kept shooting. 

Afterwards, while Charlie’s pants were still around his knees and both his pistols empty of bullets, Wade had said simply, “There’s no need for you to sleep so far away from the other men, Mr. Prince.”

For ten years, there had never been anyone but Ben Wade. And from those first days, when he’d come to understand how close he could be with this man, Charlie had never imagined that he would be separated from Ben Wade. At least not like this. Not by some crippled rancher and not by some coward from Southern Railroad. And absolutely not, he grinned as he peered out from under his hat at the dead bodies in front of the saloon, by any Marshall or his deputies. 

Charlie’s cold green eyes surveyed the street once more. There were thirty or forty guns at the ready now, chomping at the bit for their two hundred dollars. The rancher, the railroad man would pay for what they’d done to Ben Wade. Charlie Prince had the firepower. The town was gonna burn.

 

Fin


End file.
